Wednesday, October 10, 2007

- While Eric Bana has taken the villainous role in Star Trek, Chris Pine has yet to commit to James T. Kirk. The offer's open however - he simply has to choose if he'd rather take that role over the part of Junior Stemmons in Joe Carnahan's White Jazz. Or can schedules be jiggled to accomodate both films?

- Giovanna Mezzogiorno has joined German pop star Campino in the cast of Wim Wenders' romantic thriller The Palermo Shooting, currently filming in... well, Palermo. Lou Reed, Dennis Hopper and Patti Smith are to cameo.

- Motorola weren't entirely pleased with Michel Gondry's latest ad for them. Too sophisticated they say - so why on earth they hired Gondry in the first place I'll never know. A bit like Joe Roth trying to cut Julie Taymor's Across the Universe or the Weinsteins fighting Gilliam over The Brothers Grimm.

- The Academy have ditched their multicity rollout requirments for documentaries to be elligible for Oscars. Now, instead of need 14 days of play in 10 cities, 7 days in Manhattan and Los Angeles will do the trick. Is this just a symptom, or will it be a cause, of the narrowing availability of cinematic options outside NY-LA?

- Kelly Bowe is adapting Jill Smolinski's novel The Next Thing on My List into a screenplay. The HR describe it like this: June Parker is a 34-year-old woman whose life changes forever when her new acquaintance from a Weight Watchers meeting dies next to her in a car crash. After finding a list of 20 things her passenger wanted to do before she turned 25, from running a marathon to kissing a stranger, the guilt-ridden June finds new adventures while living out the wishes.

- Stuntman Bud Ekins has passed away, but his motorcycle jump in The Great Escape will live on forever.

- Anchor Bay are to distribute Fred Durst's The Education of Charlie Banks.

- Terminator 4 is to be calledTerminator Salvation: The Future Begins, and it is to be distributed by Warners, which sucks for MGM. When it rolls next year, I'm hoping McG is behind the camera - even if you aren't. Also note: Schwarzenegger may cameo, or at least, there's a possibility of this worked into the script; and this film is set in the future, amid the war between humans and the Synet cyborg forces.